<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>
<head>
<meta charset="UTF-8">
<title>Playing With Fire by JoyAndOtherStories, smolalienbee</title>
<style type="text/css">

body { background-color: #ffffff; }
.CI {
text-align:center;
margin-top:0px;
margin-bottom:0px;
padding:0px;
}
.center   {text-align: center;}
.cover    {text-align: center;}
.full     {width: 100%; }
.quarter  {width: 25%; }
.smcap    {font-variant: small-caps;}
.u        {text-decoration: underline;}
.bold     {font-weight: bold;}
</style>
</head>
<body>
<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/29213541">Playing With Fire</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/JoyAndOtherStories/pseuds/JoyAndOtherStories'>JoyAndOtherStories</a>, <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/smolalienbee/pseuds/smolalienbee'>smolalienbee</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Good Omens (TV), Good Omens - Neil Gaiman &amp; Terry Pratchett</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Adventure, Alternate Universe - Fantasy, Alternate Universe - Human, Asexual Character, Asexual Relationship, F/M, Genderfluid Anathema, Genderfluid Crowley (Good Omens), Happy Ending, He/Him Pronouns For Aziraphale (Good Omens), He/Him Pronouns For Crowley (Good Omens), M/M, Magic, Mutual Pining, Other, Pining, She/Her Pronouns for Crowley (Good Omens), They/Them Pronouns for Beelzebub (Good Omens)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>In-Progress</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2021-02-05</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2021-02-20</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-20 13:08:15</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Teen And Up Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>3</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>10,672</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/29213541</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/JoyAndOtherStories/pseuds/JoyAndOtherStories, https://archiveofourown.org/users/smolalienbee/pseuds/smolalienbee</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Crowley was sure of exactly one thing: He and his new next-door neighbor were not going to get along.</p><p>He wasn’t sure of much else in his life, if he were honest with himself (something he generally tried to avoid, but he was having a moment).</p><p>Not that Crowley cared. He was here to make music, not friends. At the moment, Crowley was much more concerned with how he was going to get home, balancing the three plants he’d just bought from the local garden center, without getting soaked in the sudden summer downpour that had just let loose in Tadfield.</p><p>“Bloody, blinking lead balloons,” Crowley swore.</p><p>“I beg your pardon?” came a posh, fussy, old-fashioned voice to his right.</p><p>Crowley looked in that direction, straight into the posh, fussy, old-fashioned face of his next-door neighbor, holding a posh, fussy, old-fashioned umbrella over both of them.</p><p> </p><p>Playing With Fire: An AU with art by smolalienbee and writing by JoyAndOtherStories that’s a little more than it seems! Featuring Ace Ineffable Partners, a bit of adventure, magical creatures, and a very happy ending. Created as part of the Good Omens Reverse Big Bang organized by Do It With Style Events!</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Anathema Device/Newton Pulsifer, Aziraphale/Crowley (Good Omens)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>74</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>95</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Collections:</b></td><td>Do It With Style Good Omens Reverse Bang</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>1. Kindling</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>This fic (written by JoyAndOtherStories) was inspired by artwork by smolalienbee, which is included at the end of the first chapter (with more artwork to come in a later chapter). The art and then the fic were created as part of the first Good Omens Reverse Big Bang!</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Crowley was sure of exactly one thing: He and his new next-door neighbor were <em>not </em>going to get along.</p><p>He wasn’t sure of much else in his life, if he were honest with himself (something he generally tried to avoid, but he was having a moment).</p><p>He wasn’t entirely sure why he’d moved to Tadfield, for one thing. It had been time to move on from London, sure, but why had he gone and chosen this tiny spot that barely even made it onto his map app?</p><p>It had been something about “go where nobody knows you so you can focus on your music away from all the pressure.” And why the <em>hell </em>had he wanted to do that? He’d had a perfectly fine career as a niche musician and a…well, a sort of cult YouTube star…which was a little weird, fine, and not how he’d expected to spend his middle-aged years, but it paid the bills. Paid them very well, really. It had the side effect that it was difficult to go to groceries or restaurants without encountering youngish people with untidy hair who awkwardly cornered him to ask for autographs (generally when he was selecting toilet roll or emerging <em>from </em>the toilet), but at least there <em>were </em>groceries and restaurants.</p><p>Hell, if he wanted to list things he was unsure of, he still wasn’t sure why he’d leapt into a music career at all. His old career in finance had been…reasonably stable, at least. He’d hated the company he’d worked for—straight out of Hell, honestly. He’d needed a change, no doubt about that. So, a decade ago, he’d cut and run, and…invented his own style of music, for some reason.</p><p> </p><p>Anyway, back to the one thing he <em>was </em>sure of. Regardless of the wisdom of the life decisions that had led him here, he was absolutely certain that he—Anthony J. Crowley, independent techno-fusion musician from fast-paced London, creature of grungy clubs and hyper-modern corners of YouTube—had utterly zero chance of getting along with Ezra Fell, utter epitome of the old-fashioned, fussy, snobbish, posh, stuffy neighbor.</p><p>The man dressed as though he’d time traveled from the 1940s, and not the fashionable parts of the 1940s. He wore an actual bow tie. And waistcoat. And jacket. <em>And </em>coat. In the <em>summer</em>. And he spoke the same way. Crowley had heard him greeting other villagers with “how do you do?” and “I hope you’re keeping well, my dear.” Like a grandfather, but one who had already been a grandfather in, say, 1950.</p><p>Crowley himself had yet to have a conversation with him. Their interactions had been limited to Fell’s looking down his nose at Crowley’s unpacking process, and a bit of mutual peering through their windows when the other didn’t seem to be looking. Crowley was certain that Fell was gathering evidence to kick him out of the neighborhood association or something. Fell was probably the president of the neighborhood association. He seemed the type.</p><p> </p><p>Not that Crowley <em>cared</em>. He was here to make music, not friends. (He’d come up with that phrase yesterday and was still proud of it.) The only reason he was even thinking about Fell was because he’d seen him walking ahead of him alongside Main Street (of <em>course </em>Tadfield actually had a Main Street that was, well, its main street). At the moment, Crowley was much more concerned with how he was going to get home, balancing the three plants he’d just bought from the local garden center (named Eden’s Walls, optimistically if not accurately), without getting soaked in the sudden summer downpour that had just let loose in Tadfield. He’d deliberately chosen to walk, which had seemed like a good decision at the time, to avoid getting dirt on the seats of his carefully-pampered vintage Bentley. Now, as rain rapidly plastered his hair in strands of red across his face, he thought he should have risked the upholstery.</p><p>Well, no, he didn’t think that. But still—</p><p>“Bloody, blinking lead balloons,” he swore.</p><p>“I beg your pardon?” came a posh, fussy, old-fashioned voice to his right.</p><p>Crowley looked in that direction, straight into the posh, fussy, old-fashioned face of his next-door neighbor, holding a posh, fussy, old-fashioned umbrella over both of them.</p><p> </p><p>Crowley blinked (a rare occurrence). “I said,” he said, shifting one of the plants to what he hoped would be a more comfortable position (it wasn’t), “bloody, blinking lead balloons.”</p><p>Fell’s forehead creased as he thought this through. “I suppose so,” he said doubtfully, but didn’t question further. (A good thing, as Crowley didn’t have any particular idea what he’d meant either.) “Were you headed home, my dear?”</p><p>“I—nnngg—yes, <em>obviously</em>,” Crowley replied, trying to indicate the plants and failing, since his hands were occupied with holding them.</p><p>“That looks like a terribly awkward load, I must say,” Fell said. Fussily. “May I be of assistance?”</p><p>“What? No, I—wait, you can’t just—ngk.”</p><p>Fell had taken the middle of the three pots—which couldn’t in any way be described as lightweight—and was now carrying it one-handed as if it weighed no more than a toy. Not that Crowley could imagine Fell with toys.</p><p>“It’s…uh…heavy,” Crowley protested weakly.</p><p>“Nonsense, my boy; it’s quite manageable. And it’s not as though we have far to walk—which is a good thing, since you’re soaked right through.”</p><p>“I’m fine,” said Crowley, who was starting to shiver.</p><p> </p><p>His hands were numb by the time they reached his house, although he wasn’t about to admit this to Fell.</p><p>“You simply must change into warm and dry clothing immediately, dear boy,” Fell said as they both set the plants down on an otherwise-vacant counter. “You’re shivering, and your hands are numb.”</p><p>Crowley opened his mouth to argue, looked into Fell’s earnestly concerned face, and gave up.</p><p> </p><p>By the time he’d dried off, changed, and returned to his kitchen, Fell had a steaming cup of tea waiting for him.</p><p>“How…how the…<em>I </em>don’t even know where my tea things are,” Crowley protested.</p><p>“Oh, I know my way around a kitchen, my dear,” Fell replied, his eyes actually twinkling. Crowley found himself sitting down and being served tea at his own kitchen table.</p><p>“I can never get the kettle to heat that fast either,” Crowley grumbled. It was very good tea.</p><p>Fell looked mildly concerned. “One simply needs the right touch, I’m sure.” He rocked awkwardly back and forth on his feet, then: “Would you mind if I…joined you?”</p><p>“Huh?” said Crowley. “Oh—nnnhh, sure. Whatever. I mean…you made the tea, you may as well have some.”</p><p>“Oh, thank you,” said Fell, beaming, and served himself tea before sitting down at Crowley’s kitchen table.</p><p>“But…” said Crowley—he was still befuddled, but the tea had steadied him a bit—“I don’t get it—why’d you—any of it? The umbrella, the plant, the—the tea?”</p><p>Fell drew back, startled. “It would have been terribly un-neighborly to have left you in the rain at Eden’s Walls, my dear.”</p><p>“Un-neighborly?” Crowley frowned. “What d’you care about being neighborly? You haven’t said a word to me since I moved in!”</p><p>“I—ah—yes, I do apologize for that—it’s only that, well, I…” Fell trailed off, a faint blush touching his round cheeks.</p><p>“You what?” Crowley wasn’t nearly up to his usual standard of wittiness. The cheeks were oddly distracting, for one thing.</p><p>“I…must admit, I rather thought you’d disapprove of me,” Fell said finally, looking down at his own hands as he smoothed his waistcoat.</p><p>“You thought <em>I’d </em>disapprove of <em>you</em>?” Crowley demanded, incredulous.</p><p>“Well, you’re very <em>modern</em>, dear boy,” Fell said. “And I’m…well…not.”</p><p>“Yeah…” Crowley said slowly, “that’s why <em>you’d </em>disapprove of <em>me</em>.”</p><p>Fell met his gaze again, eyes round in surprise. “Oh, dear me, no. That would be shockingly narrow-minded of me.”</p><p>“Mmgnn,” said Crowley. He considered, for a moment, denying that he’d ever thought such a thing about Fell, then gave it up. “Figured you were hunting for violations of the neighborhood association codes, honestly.”</p><p>“Me?” Fell’s eyes went even wider. “Goodness, no. In fact”—he fidgeted—"I’m afraid I’m on rather shaky ground with the neighborhood association myself. They seem to think I’m rather…eccentric.”</p><p>“You don’t say,” said Crowley.</p><p> </p><p>It was over an hour later when Fell left, after the closest thing to a proper tea that Crowley’d had in ages (Crowley had honestly no idea where the supplies had come from). By then, Fell was insisting that Crowley call him “Ezra” (Crowley was still “Crowley,” because hell if he was going to let anyone call him “Anthony”) and had invited Crowley over for tea at his place the next day—and Crowley, greatly to his own surprise, had accepted. For the rest of the evening, Crowley was left with an unexpected touch of loneliness, now that his kitchen was empty again, and an oddly persistent impression of round, pink cheeks and a twinkling smile.</p><p>The cheeks and smile rapidly became a fixture in Crowley’s still-inexplicable new life. This was partly because he found himself thinking of them sort of…well, always…but also because he found that tea—and dinner, and the occasional brunch—with Ezra had become an essential piece of his routine (with frankly bewildering rapidity). Ezra’s cheeks and smile—and twinkling eyes and plump waist and soft hands—presided happily over tea and biscuits, and then wine and filet mignon, and eventually hot cocoa and crepes. And desserts, desserts at any and all times. Ezra enjoyed nearly all food with a thoroughness that drew Crowley’s eyes hopelessly, but desserts were a special category—so special that Crowley took up baking just to see more of it. He’d learned to bake at some point in his life, probably, so while he doubted he’d pass Paul Hollywood’s judgement, he could manage a biscuit or a cake that brought out Ezra’s beaming smile and a little moan of pleasure on that first bite.</p><p>He found other ways to bring out that smile as well. Ezra’s home was a veritable hoard of treasured books and odd knickknacks spanning centuries (Ezra admitted to a bit of an antiquing habit that in no way endeared him to the neighborhood association), but contained nothing alive and growing.</p><p>“Oh no, I’m simply dreadful with plants, I’m afraid,” Ezra sighed when Crowley pointed this out. “I wish it weren’t the case; I do love a touch of green, but they shrivel up as soon as they’re left alone with me.” So Crowley installed a hanging basket outside on Ezra’s porch with a simple trailing vine that he tended himself. He explained to Ezra that it hadn’t been doing well at his own house because the lighting was wrong, and tried to pretend that he wasn’t cataloguing Ezra’s smile every time he passed it.</p><p> </p><p>Besides food, Crowley noted, what made Ezra most happy was his collection of books—well, “collection” seemed like an understatement, really. Ezra’s books towered on shelves and in stacks that Crowley was sure defied the laws of physics. The house presumably <em>had </em>interior walls, but Crowley had never seen them, and he thought it entirely possible that the roof was entirely supported by books at this point. Unfortunately, Crowley had no hope of contributing anything new to Ezra’s collection, but fortunately, Ezra seemed more than happy to simply talk with a willing listener about his existing books.</p><p>“This one looks like you,” Crowley said, smirking. They were looking through a book of historical artwork, and Crowley was developing a knack for spotting round-cheeked, chubby, cherubic subjects. This particular one was an angel, hovering solicitously over some sort of religious scene, smiling beatifically.</p><p>“Don’t be absurd, my dear.” Ezra gave Crowley a severe look over the tops of his tiny spectacles.</p><p>“Seriously, you could have been the model for it,” Crowley said, tilting the book to find the best angle. “Except it was done in 1500-something. I’m sure you could sit as a model for people trying to paint angels these days too, though. Could fund your retirement, stop pretending to sell books or whatever it is you do.”</p><p>“Don’t be ridiculous,” Ezra said, turning the page firmly. “I’m sure I’d hate modeling. Sitting still for so long with all those eyes on you—it seems most disagreeable.”</p><p>“You’d be fine if they let you read a book, <em>angel</em>,” Crowley said. “I expect you could sit until you gathered dust as long as you had a good book to read.”</p><p>“Do hush,” said Ezra, then smiled, a bit too sweetly. “Oh, look—this one looks like you.”</p><p>The painting featured a thin person, with flowing red hair, dying a rather over-anguished death. Crowley snorted. “As if I’d ever be that melodramatic.”</p><p>Ezra raised his eyebrows. “Weren’t you just yesterday threatening to put a plant in the garbage disposal because you found a single leaf spot?”</p><p>“Wrnnnnk—that’s different! You can’t let them slack off, or, or…oh hey, this one looks like R. P. Tyler.” He’d turned to a painting of exceedingly dour-looking fellows in grey suits.</p><p>“Hmm,” said Ezra. “He does that have that…disapproving look about him.”</p><p> </p><p>R. P. Tyler, unlike Ezra, actually was the president of the neighborhood association, and <em>absolutely was </em>the type. Crowley had experienced the misfortune of three conversations with him so far over his three months in Tadfield.</p><p>“I wonder what old R. P. would say if I outed him for secretly being a time traveler,” Crowley mused, still surveying the grumpy, grey fellows in the centuries-old painting.</p><p>“Most likely he’d accuse you of rolling piffy flabbers in your bobo shack,” said Ezra coolly, taking a sip of his tea.</p><p> </p><p>Crowley couldn’t spend all his time eating and flipping through old books with Ezra, sadly—he did have to work at least occasionally. He assumed his music would annoy Ezra, and vacillated between gleefully enjoying that prospect and feeling vaguely guilty about it. Ezra himself said nothing about it at all, which Crowley found disconcerting at first and then increasingly irritating. He resorted to playing at all hours, hoping for a reaction.</p><p>He got one at last, one December morning when he’d been up especially late, homing in on the chord structure he wanted in his newest song.</p><p>“My dear, have you been having trouble sleeping?” Ezra asked over brunch in Crowley’s kitchen, eyes crinkling with concern.</p><p>“Huh?” Crowley replied.</p><p>“Forgive me for prying, but I did hear you…ah…practicing, quite late last night, and…well, for several nights, in fact, and I was wondering if you were having a bit of insomnia.”</p><p><em>Finally</em>, Crowley thought. “Angel, if it’s bothering you, then you should just say so,” he smirked.</p><p>Ezra’s face only showed confusion. “Bothering me, dear?”</p><p>Crowley rolled his eyes. “Keeping you up at night, breaking your concentration, violating the noise codes, forcing you to listen to modern garbage music—that sort of thing.”</p><p>“Crowley! You really shouldn’t refer to your work as garbage. You clearly put quite a good deal of thought and time into it.”</p><p>Crowley choked into his hot cocoa. “You can’t possibly enjoy it.”</p><p>“Can’t I?” said Ezra, frowning. “I suppose it’s not precisely to my taste, but I find it rather soothing.”</p><p>While it was true that Crowley’s music had been described as “like a techno take on a snake charmer” by an overly ambitious reviewer once, his practice for the past few nights had involved discordant chords resolving with unpredictable crashes. Even he wouldn’t describe it as soothing.</p><p>“You hardly ever talk about your musical career,” Ezra went on, before Crowley could formulate any of this. “You must have traveled a great deal. I’m sure it’s very exciting.”</p><p>“It’s…uhhnngg…yeah, exciting, sure.” Exciting was…one word for it. “Exhausting” might have been more accurate. For the traveling and touring part, anyway. Not that Crowley had been big enough to do massive tours, but still—sleeping in a different room every night, never being really clear what city he was in, visiting new places but seeing barely any of them—he couldn’t imagine any incentive that would drag him back into that. He loved the performances themselves—pouring himself out into the music, lifting his audience to some kind of level away from day-to-day life, scandalizing certain circles with whatever outfit he’d cobbled together—</p><p>Come to think of it, if he couldn’t annoy Ezra with obnoxious music practice, at least he could use his old pics to draw out that little shocked gasp and wide round eyes.</p><p>“Here,” he said, pulling up his publicity photos on his phone. “Take a look.”</p><p>Ezra took the phone gingerly and began scrolling through the photos, delicately using one finger.</p><p>“Hmm,” he murmured, pausing and looking closely at one from a few years ago, when Crowley had been using she/her pronouns and wearing a variety of slinky dresses. Crowley watched his eyes widen and braced himself for shock management as Ezra opened his mouth.</p><p>“Do you do your own eyeliner, dear?” Ezra asked. “Because those wings are simply <em>exquisite</em>.”</p><p>“Ngk,” said Crowley.</p><p> </p><p>To Crowley’s even greater surprise, he found himself enjoying the December holidays with Ezra. Exactly what holiday Ezra was celebrating was a bit vague—it involved a good deal of décor, and a roaring Yule log, and sweet and savory foods from what seemed to be dozens of traditions—but he did it with gusto. Crowley came along for the ride, and provided extra entertainment by mocking R. P. Tyler’s increasingly shrill complaints about Ezra’s (and Crowley’s) lack of compliance with neighborhood decoration protocol.</p><p>For New Year’s Day, Crowley tried his hand at cupcakes. He made them with a rich chocolate base, and alternated between red and blue icing (with a not-too-closely-examined thought that the differing colors matched his and Ezra’s differing aesthetics), and then added sprinkles, which was ridiculous but would probably make Ezra smile.</p><p>He carried them over still in his apron and oven mitts, for the freshest possible New Year’s treat.</p><p>“Happy New Year, angel!” he yelled, knocking on the door with his elbow, and waited on the porch, imagining Ezra in his armchair, finding a bookmark, making his way around piles of books to his entryway—</p><p> </p><p>The door swung open, and a huge head jutted out, a head that simply didn’t <em>compute</em>—</p><p>Tan and beige scales—</p><p>Jagged teeth—</p><p>Spectacles—<em>Ezra’s spectacles</em>, Crowley’s brain supplied—</p><p> </p><p>Crowley definitely didn’t scream.</p><p> </p><p>“Oh, my dear boy, those look delicious!” the head said, in Ezra’s voice, just before the cupcakes tumbled to the ground.</p><p>
  
</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0002"><h2>2. Sparks</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>Explanations ensue, as well as (gasp) social interactions. Will Crowley be able to keep this rather substantial secret?</p>
          </blockquote><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Chapter level content warning--Crowley experiences a migraine in this chapter. It's brief, and he's appropriately equipped to manage it.</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>“Oh dear,” Crowley heard Ezra’s voice say. “I do apologize, dear boy. I forgot myself.” A second later, Ezra stood in front of him—ordinary, human Ezra, standing in his doorway with his bowtie in place, spectacles glinting on his adorable upturned nose—</p><p>The nose that had been a giant snout, with teeth and scales, a moment before.</p><p>“What,” said Crowley, “what the Hell.”</p><p>“Oh, my dear, please do come in and sit down,” said Ezra. “You look quite faint.”</p><p>Crowley found himself being led inside, stepping over smashed cupcakes, and a few moments later was seated at Ezra’s kitchen table.</p><p>“You—nrrrk—you were—dragon.”</p><p>Ezra drew in a long breath and let it out in a slow sigh.</p><p>“Are you going to tell me I’m imagining things?” Crowley demanded.</p><p>“Certainly not!” Ezra’s face managed to look <em>more </em>shocked than Crowley felt. “That would be gaslighting.”</p><p>“Ahyyy—oh.” On second thought, Crowley might have preferred to have been told he was imagining things. “You…were…you really were? I mean…you can turn into a dragon?”</p><p>“Ah, well, strictly speaking, no,” said Ezra. “To be entirely accurate, I can turn into a human.”</p><p>Crowley stared. His head was beginning to pound uncomfortably, so this took a while to penetrate. “You…you <em>are </em>a dragon? And all this time…you’ve been…masquerading?”</p><p>“Ah…I wouldn’t call it that, I must say. It’s true that my human form isn’t my first form, but I’m very fond of it. It’s…comfortable. Like my home, or…or a well-fitted coat. At this point, my natural form is only just a tiny shade more familiar, really.”</p><p>“Huh,” said Crowley, insightfully. He massaged his temples. His oven mitts had been deposited on the table next to him, at some point.</p><p>Ezra wrung his hands. “I—I’ve never…I’ve really never explained this to…to an ordinary human before. Not that you’re ordinary, dear.” He patted Crowley’s hand, and then withdrew quickly as if unsure he would be allowed. “I’d imagine that you have a number of questions.”</p><p>“I always have questions,” Crowley mumbled. He squinted at Ezra. “Is that your real name? Ezra Fell?”</p><p>“Ah—not precisely, no.”</p><p>Crowley grimaced. “Is it one of those magic name things?”</p><p>Ezra cocked his head to one side quizzically. Crowley was visited with a vision of him doing that in dragon form. It was unsettling. No…it <em>should </em>have been unsettling. Actually, it was cute.</p><p>“I beg your pardon?” Ezra asked. Cutely.</p><p>“Y’know, where you can’t tell anyone your true name, because they’d…I dunno, have power over you, or something.”</p><p>“Oh! No, no, thank Heavens, nothing like that. It’s just that we’re very ancient, and we had our names long before current human naming traditions. Mine is Aziraphale. You can see why my…well, my pseudonym…is more comfortable for humans.”</p><p>“Aziraphale,” Crowley echoed. “It’s not <em>that </em>bad. It suits—wait. <em>We</em>? There are more of you?” He looked around the room, as if more surprise dragons might be lurking behind stacks of books.</p><p>“Oh my, of course there are more. I certainly wouldn’t want to be the only one. That would be dreadfully lonely. Even more lonely than—well. Yes, there are a number of us.”</p><p>“Right,” said Crowley, trying to push through an unpleasant spinning sensation, presumably a reaction to the idea of crews of dragons roaming around. “Umm…where are the others? Is everyone in Tadfield a dragon? Is that why the weather’s so weird?”</p><p>“No, of course not,” said Ezra—Aziraphale. “I’m the only shapeshifter in Tad—ah, sorry—what on Earth do you mean, the weather is…weird?”</p><p>“I mean it’s normal.”</p><p>Ezra’s brow furrowed. “Are you sure you’re quite alright, dear? I’m afraid I did give you a substantial shock.”</p><p>“No, I mean, it’s <em>too </em>normal,” said Crowley, who was definitely not alright. “It’s exactly right for the time of year. It was all…crisp, you know, in the Autumn, and then there was snow <em>on Christmas</em>. Is it always like that?”</p><p>“Certainly not,” said Ezra. “It was…oh…fifteen years ago that we had a <em>flood </em>on Christmas; can you imagine? And just over ten years ago there was a dreadful cold snap in early Spring that did awful things to the fruit and flowers.” He paused, reminiscing. “I suppose there hasn’t been anything too unusual since then, now that you mention it. It’s been very seasonally appropriate, one might say.”</p><p>“That’s, see, that’s what I mean, it’s <em>too </em>appropr—wait.” Something else Ezra—Aziraphale—had said had just now made its way into Crowley’s awareness. “Wait, ancient? You said ancient. As in…did you mean…dragons are an ancient…uhnnn…species? Or, as in, you personally are ancient?”</p><p>“The…the second of those options, dear boy. Well, I suppose, to be completely thorough, both are true. But…well, I have been around for quite a long while.”</p><p>“How…how long?” Crowley asked, a little faintly. The pounding in his head was not improving.</p><p>Ez—Aziraphale fidgeted. “Ah…always, really.”</p><p>“Ahheuurrggh,” Crowley replied. “So you’re…nnuuhh…immortal.”</p><p>“Y-yes, I’m afraid so,” admitted Aziraphale, as if being immortal was a bit tactless. “We can…we can be killed, but we don’t…age and die, the way…er, the way humans do.”</p><p>“Rrright,” said Crowley. “So, you’ve just been around for all of human civilization?” He looked around at what he could see of Aziraphale’s piles of cluttered books and—“Treasure. You don’t—you didn’t get all of this from antiquing. You’ve been <em>collecting</em>. Since…always.” He looked around again, feeling for the first time the sheer weight of the years represented in this fairly modest, small-town home. “It’s like a dragon’s—no—skrgkrktk—no, it’s not <em>like </em>a dragon’s hoard—it’s literally a dragon’s hoard. This is your—your dragon cave.”</p><p>Aziraphale tutted. “Nonsense, dear boy—we don’t live in caves. We’re not <em>primitives</em>. We have <em>standards</em>.”</p><p>Crowley would have chuckled, but it probably would have made his headache worse. Then, as another thought percolated to the surface:</p><p>“So that’s why you’re always warm.”</p><p>Aziraphale’s forehead crinkled. “Am I?”</p><p>“Are you joking? You’re like a bloody furnace.”</p><p>“Oh my,” said Aziraphale, looking apologetic. “I’m not sure anyone’s ever mentioned that before. I hope I haven’t been making you uncomfortably warm, or—”</p><p>“No, no, it’s fine,” Crowley assured him. “Not uncomfortable. ‘S nice, really—I mean, I’m always cold, so…it’s nice. Yeah.” (Since <em>I want to wrap myself around you like a bloody python</em> would have probably have been a bit much.)</p><p>Aziraphale still looked a bit uncertain, but as he looked at Crowley, his expression shifted back to concern. “Dear, are you <em>sure </em>you’re alright? You really do look as if you’re feeling ill.”</p><p>“It’s my head,” Crowley finally conceded. “It’s—I think it’s a migraine.”</p><p>“Oh, I’m terribly sorry,” Aziraphale said, exuding sympathy. “Are you prone to migraines often?”</p><p>“Nnngg, not really,” said Crowley. “Just”—he wrinkled his nose, trying to remember—“once or twice a year, if that.”</p><p>“It must have been the shock,” said Aziraphale, distressed again. “I <em>do </em>apologize; it was horribly thoughtless of me. I was caught up in reading, and I…I suppose I completely forgot what form I was in.” He pressed his lips together and gave his head a shake. “But never mind me—you simply must get home and get some rest, my dear. Do you need—could I help you at all?”</p><p>Crowley shook his head and immediately stopped doing that. “I’ll be fine—I’ve got some meds, and, I’ll, y’know, sleep in a dark room. It’ll be fine by tomorrow.”</p><p>Aziraphale by then had ushered him worriedly to the entryway, a hand hovering near his elbow, and hurried to open the door for him. Crowley stepped out onto the porch, almost landing his foot in—</p><p>“Oh dear, the cupcakes.” Aziraphale’s face fell even farther than it already had. “Oh, and they did look so delightful. I’m terribly sorry—you must have put a good deal of work into them, and then I, I startled you so badly, and now, well…” He sighed in a way that meant Crowley had to forcibly restrain himself from wrapping his arms around him.</p><p>“That’s—that was only half the batch,” Crowley said. “I kept some back for later.” His kitchen seemed a lifetime and maybe half a planet away at this point, but unless the rest of the world had reset itself when he’d learned that his fussy next-door neighbor was actually an immortal mythical creature, there was another set of red-and-blue-iced cupcakes waiting on his counter.</p><p>“Did you?” Aziraphale’s face tentatively lit up, then clouded again. “Oh, but, would you…I don’t know that you would want…” He glanced at Crowley through his lashes, then away, tugging at his lapels.</p><p>“Sorry?” Crowley said blankly.</p><p>“Are we—are you—” Aziraphale still couldn’t quite meet Crowley’s eyes. His hands fluttered like nervous moths. “I’d hope…I was wondering…” He took in a careful breath. “Is it possible for us to remain friends?”</p><p>Crowley blinked at him. “Why wouldn’t…did you think I’d…I wouldn’t want to—errrnnn—hang about anymore, because you’re a dragon?”</p><p>Aziraphale shot him an apprehensive look from underneath his dark gold eyebrows. “I thought it might be a bit much…and then, of course, I’ve been…deceiving you, all this time.”</p><p>“Hell, angel,” said Crowley. “Are you kidding? This is the most interesting thing that’s happened since I got here. Or ever, probably. You’re not getting rid of me that easily.”</p><p>“R-really?” A fragile hope slowly suffused Aziraphale’s face. “Are you sure, dear?”</p><p>“Mmnnrk, don’t be stupid, ‘course I’m sure.”</p><p>“Oh—oh, that’s <em>wonderful</em>, my dear.” Aziraphale seized Crowley’s chilly hands, which was like putting on warm gloves against the January air. “I’m <em>so </em>pleased to hear it.” He looked down at their hands, blinked, and gently released Crowley. “But I must let you get home to rest.”</p><p>“Euurrr,” said Crowley, who might have preferred more hand-holding to hunkering down alone in his dark bedroom, migraine or not. “Sure, yeah. Umm, maybe we can—uh, tomorrow. The rest of the cupcakes.”</p><p>“Yes—yes, that would be marvelous.” Aziraphale’s eyes had regained their usual sparkle, but then a shadow crossed his face. “Dear boy, I must ask…I”—he was twisting his fingers together again—“I would greatly appreciate it if you didn’t…ah…mention this to anyone else. It’s…you’re under no obligation, of course, but…it’s not something I’d like others to know about. I do enjoy Tadfield, you know, and I’d hate to have to move away, if…” He waved a worried hand.</p><p>“Oh,” said Crowley, “right, right, no no no no no, of course not. ‘Course I wouldn’t—I mean, nobody would believe me anyway. But I wouldn’t.”</p><p>“Oh—oh, thank you,” said Aziraphale, glowing with relieved gratitude. “That’s very kind of you.”</p><p>“Shut up,” Crowley grumbled. “I’m not kind, and thanking me makes me itch.”</p><p>“Still,” said Aziraphale, tamping down his smile with very limited success, “I’m very grateful.”</p><p> </p><p>Tadfield had never held so many people as when Crowley suddenly had to keep a secret from them.</p><p>This shouldn’t have been an issue—Crowley was <em>good </em>at keeping secrets. But evidently a secret the size of “your book-hoarding neighbor with dress sense from the middle of last century is actually a great flipping dragon” was a strain on his usual commitment to extreme privacy.</p><p>R. P. Tyler was easy; Crowley never wanted to tell him anything anyway. But now, every time Tyler turned up poking around Aziraphale’s garden, Crowley <em>worried</em>. If the character description of “interfering busybody” came to life, it would take the form of R. P. Tyler. Aziraphale’s heartbreakingly sad eyes, when he spoke of not wanting to be forced to leave Tadfield, haunted Crowley particularly strongly when he saw Tyler snooping.</p><p>Less malicious, but at least as nosy, were the town’s resident gang of roving ten-year-olds. They even had a name—The Them—and a leader—Adam Young. Crowley had first encountered Adam when R. P. Tyler had cornered the lad to berate him about allegedly stealing apples or something. Crowley approved of stealing apples, and at any rate, nobody deserved to have Tyler’s attention centered on them for that long. He’d driven past in the Bentley, slowly, practically sauntering on wheels, windows down, one of his Queen albums blaring <em>Put Out the Fire</em>. Tyler had done his best to chase him down, shouting about noise ordinances while trying to hold on to his little dog at the same time. By the time Tyler had realized he couldn’t actually catch a car while on foot (dog or no dog), Adam was long gone. In addition to solidly establishing Crowley’s enmity with Tyler, this had entrenched in Crowley an odd sense of protectiveness for Adam.</p><p>Not that the kid appeared to need protection. Trouble slid off of him like…like something that slid easily off another thing. His little gang was improbably well-balanced in important characteristics—accuracy (Wensleydale), assertiveness (Pepper), and dirt (Brian). Adam himself, like the weather in Tadfield, was so intensely ordinary as to be firmly out-of-the-ordinary, like an archetype of boyhood come to life.</p><p>The Them popped up in Crowley and Aziraphale’s adjoining gardens on a regular but unpredictable basis, enacting dramas which probably made sense to them and involved an unreasonable amount of shouting <em>Ol</em><em>é</em>. Crowley didn’t think they were deliberately snooping, but he could easily imagine Aziraphale “forgetting himself” again and being spotted in dragon form through a window.</p><p>In the category of “definitely probably snooping” fell Anathema Device, a young American person, currently using she/her pronouns, who had an obsession with books. Well, a book. Some ancestor of hers named Agnes had written a book of prophecies, which seemed like a weird way to spend your free time, but Crowley was hardly one to judge. Anyway, the book had gotten mysteriously separated from Anathema’s family when she was something like ten years old, and now that she was an adult, she’d made it her mission to find it. Everyone needed a hobby, Crowley supposed, but—</p><p>“If you’re trying to find a lost book from America, what are you doing in Tadfield?” he asked Anathema. She, Crowley, and Aziraphale were lounging in Aziraphale’s lounge, with wine, on a mid-February evening. Well, she and Crowley were lounging. Aziraphale, in his usual armchair, had only relaxed his posture a few fractions of an inch, and that had required at least three glasses of wine.</p><p>“Because the prophecy said to be here,” Anathema replied, brandishing her glass at Crowley. The wine in it was elderberry that she’d brewed—distilled? Stomped? Whatever you did to make wine—herself, and despite being barely old enough to drink it, she was holding her own against a seasoned drinker like Crowley and a…well, a millennia-old dragon like Aziraphale.</p><p>Crowley concentrated. Sloshily. “So your descendant—no…th’other thing. Ancient. Old person. Great-grand…thingy.”</p><p>“Grandcestor,” Aziraphale put in helpfully.</p><p>“Yeah, that—Nutter. She made a prophecy book, and one of the prophets…prophecies was that the book would get stolen? Wouldn’t it be easier to just prophess—prophetess—prophesy how to avoid book thieves?”</p><p>“The Nice and Accurate Prophecies aren’t a security system,” Anathema said, indignantly. “There’s a <em>plan</em>. The prophecies are just one part of it.”</p><p>“A Great Plan,” Aziraphale agreed, though it was a bit slurred. “Pieces coming together. In harmony. B-beauti—beautifully,” he added, his lips pursing with the effort. Crowley thought about kissing them.</p><p>“Prophecy Number 829,” Anathema exposited. “Anathema, thou must tarry in Tad’s Field, and my words shall find thee, once the shifting hearts are loosed and bound.”</p><p>Crowley thought about this, though he was a little distracted by the way Aziraphale’s piles of not-lost books were spinning around him, and a vague suspicion that he might have a headache in the morning. “If you don’t have the book, how do you know what the prophecy says?” He pointed at Anathema triumphantly.</p><p>She rolled her eyes. “We have copies of the prophecies,” she said. “We’re not amateurs.”</p><p>“Little cards,” said Aziraphale, nodding. “In lovely little boxes. Very neat. But no book.”</p><p>“I thought he’d have it,” said Anathema, accusingly, in Aziraphale’s direction. “All those old books—figured he’d gotten hold of it somehow.”</p><p>“But I don’t,” Aziraphale said mournfully. “I’ve wanted it for…centuries.” He squinted, considering this. “Decades. Lots of years. But no copies were ever sold. Yours is the only one in…in the world, my dear.”</p><p>“And it’s lost,” Crowley observed.</p><p>“Lost,” sighed Aziraphale.</p><p>Anathema looked at both of them severely. “It will be back. Agnes said it would return to me, and she’s never been wrong.”</p><p>“In th’meantime, you’re stuck here,” Crowley pointed out. “In Tad’s Field. Who the hell was Tad?”</p><p>“Mmm,” said Anathema. “It’s not the worst place to be.”</p><p> </p><p>Tadfield definitely had a few perks for Anathema—or maybe one perk in particular, whose name was Newton Pulsifer. Getting together with someone on the basis of a prophecy seemed like a poor life choice to Crowley, who had some experience with poor life choices. However, Anathema and Newt seemed to be making it work, or at least they were in the times when Crowley saw them together—which were a bit limited, since Newt wasn’t allowed in Crowley’s house, after his first visit when he managed to fry Crowley’s second-favorite mixer just by being in the same room with it. The audio kind of mixer, not the baking kind, although Crowley wouldn’t have been surprised if Newt was also capable of incapacitating the baking kind—he seemed to have that effect on any electronics more complicated than a hand-cranked torch.</p><p> </p><p>It was sometime in March that Crowley realized that he might have achieved his goal in moving to Tadfield—or at least, what he assumed his goal must have been, since he still wasn’t entirely sure what had possessed him to come here—anyway, he was pretty sure he’d been looking for anonymity, or something close to it—</p><p>And he had it.</p><p>Aziraphale indulged his musical talents with kind interest but preferred to live in books that were a minimum of a century old, while Anathema only cared about developments mentioned in Agnes’s prophecies (and apparently Crowley’s musical career wasn’t covered). Newt’s technology-frying superpower kept him from accessing YouTube, and the crew of ten-year-olds were far more interested in their own dramatic inventions than in minor stars of the minimalist-techno-scream YouTube scene. The adults closer to Crowley’s own age—The Them’s parents, Newt’s mother, R. P. Tyler—evidently shared a belief that a musical career resulting in semi-fame Must Not Be Spoken Of, in the same way that you’d carry on without referring to someone letting loose a fart in a closed room. Admittedly, this meant sometimes scraping for conversational topics—Mr. Young, Adam’s father, made frequent attempts to engage Crowley in conversation about his pre-music career, after Crowley had made the mistake of mentioning that he’d worked in finance.</p><p>“It was just, y’know, finance,” said Crowley, a bit desperately, in response to Mr. Young’s questions, and sent a pleading glance for help in Aziraphale’s direction.</p><p> </p><p>But awkward conversations aside, Crowley took stock of the life he had here, and tentatively began feeling his way toward being pleased—a truly shocking condition for him. Sure, he had a hopeless crush on his best friend and neighbor, who was also secretly a dragon, but other than that, for the first time in ages, Crowley was living like—like a <em>normal </em>person. And he <em>liked </em>it.</p><p> </p><p>So, naturally, that was when the weird things started happening.</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0003"><h2>3. Flames</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>The weather warms up and the weird things begin!</p>
          </blockquote><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Chapter-level content warning: Crowley experiences repeated headaches and/or migraines in this chapter. Migraine medication is mentioned (no details).</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>The first weird thing was Crowley’s own fault.</p><p>To be honest, it probably wasn’t even weird. Just deeply personally inconvenient.</p><p> </p><p>The thing was that Aziraphale was warm. Of course he was warm; he was a dragon. He could breathe fire if he wanted (and even when he didn’t want—stray wisps of smoke sometimes escaped his nostrils when he was deeply occupied in a book). But the thing was—the <em>thing </em>was—Crowley was not warm. Like, ever. He wanted to be warm, and he hadn’t even been aware of how badly he wanted to be warm until he started spending time with Aziraphale.</p><p>Aziraphale’s warmth was like a magnet, or a black hole, or…something that pulled on other things—or at least pulled on Crowley. A Crowley-specific magnet.</p><p>And so it probably shouldn’t have been a surprise on a chilly late-winter afternoon when he drifted to sleep on Aziraphale’s couch and woke up…on Aziraphale.</p><p>“Ngk,” he said, disentangling himself as quickly as he could. “I—uh—I—sorry. I didn’t mean to—” He waved his arms, trying to convey anything other than <em>you’re warm and soft and I kind of want to stay wrapped around you on a permanent basis</em>. “You should’ve just—woken me up. Shoved me off.”</p><p>“Oh, no, I couldn’t have done—it would have been terribly inconsiderate, dear boy,” said Aziraphale, who was on his feet, twisting his hands in that way he did when he was nervous or uncomfortable, and <em>dammit</em>, that meant that Crowley had made him nervous or uncomfortable—“You looked so very peaceful; I couldn’t bring myself to—but…” He trailed off, swallowed, and tried again. “But…I—I feel that I must set some boundaries, my dear…before we…before anything…oh, for the Host’s sake.” He clenched his hands into fists at his side and straightened his shoulders. “I don’t—I can’t be in any sort of…romantic relationship.”</p><p>“That’s fine, that’s fine, I’m not asking, I don’t—that’s fine,” Crowley said, clambering rapidly to his own feet. His face, for once, was generating its own heat; a blush was burning its way across his cheeks. “I’ll just, uh, go.”</p><p>“Please, Crowley, wait,” Aziraphale stopped him, looking distressed. “You deserve an explanation.”</p><p>“I really don’t,” Crowley assured him.</p><p>“Please do let me explain, though,” said Aziraphale. “There are a number of factors, and—and none of them reflect badly on you, at all, and I’d hate for you to think…” He sighed, and looked up at Crowley with the pleading eyes that would always, always get their way if Crowley was involved.</p><p>“Oh, fine, go on,” Crowley said, shoving his hands in his pockets and scowling at the floor, like the mature middle-aged man that he was.</p><p>“Right,” said Aziraphale, and at least he now sounded as awkward as Crowley felt. “Yes, well. Ah—I’m asexual, for one thing.”</p><p>Crowley looked back up at him. “Well that’s—nnhhh—that’s fine—I mean, so am I. If it’s just that you don’t—you wouldn’t want a sexual relationship, that’s—I wouldn’t either.” Crowley was blushing again. Or blushing <em>more</em>—it wasn’t as though he’d stopped blushing from the first time. Talking to Aziraphale about sex, or even the lack thereof, was not something that had been in his plans for the day. “Are—are all dragons asexual?”</p><p>“Oh, no,” said Aziraphale, rolling his eyes, “no—certainly not. We have a very similar spectrum as humans do, you might say. In fact, it’s—there have been…incidents. There were some, ah, problems. Potential threats. So we’re—we’re forbidden from relationships, now. With humans, I mean.”</p><p>“From—from any relationships?” Crowley asked, against his better judgement. “Or just sexual relationships?”</p><p>“Ah…oh,” said Aziraphale, his forehead furrowing. “I…I feel that the spirit of the rule is related to any relationships, but the…the letter of it may only relate to…ah…sexual matters. Nobody’s ever—ever tested it, that I know of. Any relationships with humans are…very strongly frowned upon.”</p><p>“Frowned upon, sure,” said Crowley, ignoring the flood of forbidden love stories crowding into his head (he didn’t even <em>like </em>Romeo and Juliet, for Hell’s sake). “Forbidden, I get it. Wouldn’t want you to get in trouble.”</p><p>“I appreciate that, my dear,” Aziraphale said, sadly. “But”—he appeared to be bracing himself—“even if it weren’t forbidden to have that sort of relationship, I…well, I…”</p><p>“You wouldn’t,” Crowley finished for him. “It’s fine, angel; I didn’t expect you to be attracted to me, or—or—”</p><p>“It’s not—it’s not that, Crowley!” Aziraphale interrupted him. “It’s—oh, bother, I’ve already let myself become closer to you than—you’re already more dear to me than any other human in…oh, I don’t even know—but that’s just it; you’re—you’re <em>human</em>—not that there’s anything wrong with being human. It’s that you’re <em>mortal</em>.”</p><p>“I’m…” Crowley squinted. “Well, of course I’m…oh.”</p><p>Aziraphale’s lips were trembling. “You’re mortal, and I’m…not. And that means that…you’ll…”</p><p>“I’ll die, eventually.”</p><p>Aziraphale flinched.</p><p>Crowley processed this for a few moments, imagining a life where, if you ever allowed yourself to seek companionship—anything more meaningful than a casual acquaintance—you were dooming yourself to eventual heartbreak, over and over.</p><p>“Blimey,” he said.</p><p>Aziraphale’s shoulders drooped. “Yes, I suppose so.”</p><p> </p><p>They still had dinner together, achieving something close to their usual banter by the time they started on dessert. Ordinarily, Crowley would have stayed for wine, but he declined this time, pretending not to see the hurt that crossed Aziraphale’s face before he affixed his polite smile back on and wished Crowley good night.</p><p> </p><p>Back at his house, Crowley considered breaking out wine on his own to get roaringly drunk—but waking up with a headache was not something he cared for, at his age, and plus, getting drunk alone (without Aziraphale) was honestly not remotely appealing. So he poured himself into his music instead, cranking out something angry and groaning. Maybe it would help him process or something.</p><p>Processing wasn’t really his thing, he concluded later, lying in bed and somehow still not asleep. He’d have to settle for grousing.</p><p>It made sense—he’d finally met someone who—oh, hell, he might as well admit it, now that it was officially hopeless—he’d finally fallen in love with someone—and they were an immortal magical creature who could never allow themselves to love him back.</p><p>Typical.</p><p> </p><p>The second weird thing—or maybe the first weird thing if the first thing didn’t count as a weird thing—anyway—a weird thing that happened—was that Aziraphale’s bosses started turning up.</p><p>“They don’t often bother—ah—they don’t often come to check on me,” said Aziraphale after the pair of them had left (they were called Gabriel and Sandalphon, apparently, with pompous personalities to match their names). Unlike Aziraphale, they dressed in (expensive) clothing from the current century, but somehow gave off an air of “not-normal-human” that easily eclipsed Aziraphale’s air of “generally harmless eccentric.” Aziraphale himself was exponentially more nervous after their visit. Crowley had lost track of the number of times he’d straightened his waistcoat and tugged at his lapels in the few minutes that he’d been over.</p><p>“What did they want?” Crowley asked, watching Aziraphale twist the golden winged ring on his pinky and wishing he could take that hand himself and soothe the nervousness away.</p><p>“Oh, it’s…it’s natural for them to…drop by…sometimes. I’m simply being silly, because it had been quite a while. I had the impression that they were happy to have me here, in Tadfield…ah, out of the way, you might say.”</p><p>“So they just dropped by to say hi?” asked Crowley, knowing perfectly well that they hadn’t.</p><p>“Well,” said Aziraphale, evasively. “They did have a request or two. Nothing…onerous.”</p><p>Crowley didn’t reply; he simply raised his eyebrows over his sunglasses and waited. Aziraphale avoided his gaze, looking around his kitchen and back to the remaining crumbs of the shortbread Crowley had brought over, before giving in.</p><p>“The Host,” he said fretfully, “ah, I beg your pardon; that’s our…collective term…is nervous. There have been…rumblings. Ah—rumbling in the sense of rumors, not…ordinary dragon rumbling. It’s…well, I can’t really say much about it, in fact, but suffice it to say that I’m to be on the lookout for anything unusual.”</p><p>Unusual other than a dragon living as a human in a house made of most of humanity’s literature, evidently.</p><p>Anyway, Crowley went home with a headache that day, but brought Aziraphale chocolates the next day, in hopes it would help Aziraphale feel calmer again. And then he cut him some early spring flowers from his garden. Just to brighten up his kitchen, not as a romantic gesture (a lie). The flowers withered within a day once they were in Aziraphale’s presence, but they (and the chocolates) earned Crowley Aziraphale’s beaming smile, so it was worth it.</p><p> </p><p>Spring flowered in an unreasonably beautiful way and marched on into summer with improbable timeliness. Crowley couldn’t convince Aziraphale to write this up as an unusual event in his paperwork for the Dragon Host (“I can’t report that the weather is unusual when it’s specifically <em>not </em>unusual, dear boy”), so they had to ferret around for anything else out of the ordinary to put into Aziraphale’s paperwork.</p><p>There was the “motorcycle gang” that roared through town one summer’s day, for instance. It was precisely four motorcyclists, but according to R. P. Tyler, that was more motorcycles than had ever appeared in Tadfield at one time before. Aziraphale didn’t try writing that one up either, saying that most of the Dragon Host were scarcely even aware of what motorcycles <em>were</em>, other than “human mode of transportation,” so four humans riding them through a human town wouldn’t strike them as unusual or even interesting. (Proving, Crowley noted, that even the Dragon Host was more sensible than R. P. Tyler.)</p><p>Anathema <em>did</em> find the motorcycle event interesting, or rather infuriating. There was a evidently a prophecy about “four shall ride” something something, and she was growing increasingly agitated as the months passed and she was no closer to finding her great-grandcestor’s book.</p><p>Soon after that, there was supposedly some type of disturbance at a nearby power plant. Allegedly it involved lemon candies, though Crowley was never clear on how the candy was involved. In fact, he found the whole thing fairly suspicious, since there was never any actual interruption in anyone’s electricity. It was a bit difficult to get accurate details, since their source for that one was The Them, for whom lemon candies were at least as important as electricity generation.</p><p>The Them were also the source for the next possibly-unusual rumor. Anathema and Newt had joined Aziraphale and Crowley for wine on Aziraphale’s front porch, one early-August evening, when The Them turned up, Adam’s new dog in tow. (The dog, named Dog, had turned up out of the blue—or at least out of the woods—a week ago, another event that Aziraphale had not deemed sufficiently unusual to include in a report.)</p><p>“Have you seen the giant squid?” Adam demanded.</p><p>The demand was directed mainly at Anathema; Adam had developed an affinity for her ever since she’d lent him a stack of homegrown occultist conspiracy-theory magazines and told him that the grownups didn’t want him to know what was in there.</p><p>“A giant squid?” Anathema echoed. “Where?”</p><p>“In Shadwell’s fish pond,” said Adam. “Wensleydale saw it too, and I’m taking Brian and Pepper to see it tomorrow. You can come too, if you want.”</p><p>“What did it look like?” asked Newt, nervously. (He probably wasn’t nervous about the possible existence of a giant squid. “Nervous” was just his default setting.)</p><p>“It had at least twelve arms,” said Adam, eyes gleaming. “They came up out of the water and they were all wavy.” All four of The Them waved their arms to demonstrate. Dog probably would have too, if he’d had arms. “And they were black and slimy and covered in suckers.”</p><p>“Actually they were black and slimy,” said Wensleydale, nodding seriously.</p><p>“And covered in suckers,” Adam repeated firmly.</p><p>“I think it’s the Kraken,” said Brian happily.</p><p>“That’s rubbish,” said Pepper. “The Kraken is thirty miles long; it wouldn’t fit in the fish pond.”</p><p>“Unless the fish pond is secretly connected to all the lakes in the world,” enthused Adam, throwing a stick for Dog. “Maybe it connects to Tibet. That would explain how the Tibetans get here to spy on us.”</p><p>“I don’t see why people from Tibet would want to come here to spy on us,” Pepper argued. “They’d just get bored. Nothing ever happens here. It’d be more interesting for them to just stay in Tibet.”</p><p>“Actually it is more interesting in Tibet,” said Wensleydale, as they wandered off again.</p><p>The adults on the porch were silent for a few moments.</p><p>“Huh,” said Crowley, who was feeling the threat of yet another headache.</p><p>Anathema had gotten to her feet and was now pacing. As there was only about a meter of space available on Aziraphale’s porch for doing this, it was more like off-kilter spinning, with a lot of dramatic skirt-swirling.</p><p>“That’s got to be the Kraken,” she muttered.</p><p>“Wait, you believe it?” Crowley scoffed.</p><p>“It’s a prophecy,” Anathema snapped, not slowing her pacing. “When the flailing arms ariseth from the deep where they shouldst not be, and the green one giveth warnings, then the conflagration approacheth.”</p><p>“Well, sure, if it’s in a prophecy,” grumbled Crowley. Anathema whirled toward him, skirts swishing aggressively—</p><p>“Um,” said Newt, and blinked as all the eyes in the area focused on him.</p><p>“Go on, my dear,” said Aziraphale, when Newt didn’t appear likely to do so on his own.</p><p>“It’s just that I think the next part happened this afternoon.”</p><p>“What,” Anathema said flatly.</p><p>“I beg your pardon?” said Aziraphale.</p><p>“Wait, which part?” said Crowley. “The scary approaching thing or the green thing?”</p><p>“The, uh, the green thing?” Newt answered, questioningly. “I, um, had a conversation with an alien.” He shrugged apologetically.</p><p>“An alien?” Crowley echoed.</p><p>“I don’t suppose you mean a…foreigner?” Aziraphale asked.</p><p>“Why didn’t you tell me?” demanded Anathema.</p><p>“Um,” Newt began contritely—</p><p>“Sorry, sorry,” Crowley forestalled this, “an alien? Not saying I’m doubting you, but, unnggg, there’s a lot to unpack there. What kind of alien?”</p><p>“A—er—a green one.”</p><p>“Forgive me, dear boy,” said Aziraphale after they’d digested this for a few seconds, “but do you think you could provide a little more detail? For instance, was this…being…human-shaped, but green?”</p><p>“N-no,” Newt admitted, “they were human height, I guess, with arms and legs”—he waved his own arm in illustration—"but, er, duck-shaped?” He gestured around his head in a way that conveyed exactly no information.</p><p>“A human-shaped duck?” Crowley surmised.</p><p>“Or a duck-shaped human,” Aziraphale offered.</p><p>“Yes,” Newt agreed, “only green.”</p><p>“What did they say?” Anathema waved concerns about shapes aside. “Did they give a warning about the conflagration?”</p><p>“I—I don’t think so,” said Newt. “They mostly talked about, um, pollution.”</p><p>“Pollution?” three voices echoed blankly.</p><p>“Yeah, er, they said we need to get it under control, because the ice caps are melting.”</p><p>Anathema stared.</p><p>Crowley rubbed his temples. “The green duck-billed human alien came all the way here to warn about global warming?”</p><p>“I suppose global warming could be seen as a conflagration,” Aziraphale said thoughtfully, “depending on the strictness of the definition…”</p><p>“Arrrggghh, no,” groaned Anathema, “the Nice and Accurate Prophecies of Agnes Nutter aren’t about global warming; they’re about the oncoming disastrous war!”</p><p>“Right, since that’s better,” Crowley said, rubbing his face. Migraine medication was in his almost-immediate future.</p><p>“And how to avert it,” Anathema added, pacing even more furiously, “which is the important part, obviously, except that I don’t know what to <em>do</em>!”</p><p>“My dear, I’m certain that you’ve done all you can,” said Aziraphale, consolingly.</p><p>“I haven’t done <em>anything</em>,” she retorted, gripping her hair. “There’s supposed to be help from an unexpected quarter, and a friend being important, and a fallen ash tree, and I haven’t found any of those.”</p><p>“There were lots of trees where I met the alien,” Newt spoke up.</p><p>“Well, there you have it,” said Aziraphale. “A real—ah—<em>lead</em>, as they say, for you to investigate.”</p><p> </p><p>Anathema and Newt left not long after that, following some discussion of the location where Newt had met the…alien. The green duck-billed environmentalist, anyway.</p><p>“That should give them a fun outing tomorrow,” said Crowley, mentally debating how much longer he could stay before he absolutely had to go home and take medication.</p><p>“I only hope they don’t disturb the scene too badly before I get there,” said Aziraphale.</p><p>“Huh?” said Crowley, achieving dizzying heights of wittiness.</p><p>“Well, clearly it’s the sort of thing I must investigate.” Aziraphale, Crowley abruptly noted, was a good bit less drunk than he had appeared before their guests’ departure. Come to think of it—gosh. Aziraphale had been guiding the conversation all along to gather the necessary location details from Newt.</p><p>“You don’t think it’s a…it can’t be something related to your lot, can it?”</p><p>Aziraphale wrinkled his nose. “We’re shapeshifters, my dear. Someone human-sized but with a non-human shape is…well, at the least, it must be looked into.”</p><p>Crowley tried not to wince as his head pulsed uncomfortably. “Newt saw someone with a mask on, angel. Some kind of a prank.”</p><p>“I certainly hope so,” said Aziraphale, noncommittally.</p><p>Crowley sighed. “I’ll drive you,” he said, rolling his eyes.</p><p>“Oh, would you?” Aziraphale’s eyes lit up gratefully. Then he faltered—“but will you feel well enough?”</p><p>So much for hiding his symptoms.</p><p>“I’ll be fine by tomorrow morning,” Crowley said.</p><p> </p><p>He was, mostly. His headache had faded to a low-level background throbbing that he could ignore, sort of. In any case, driving Aziraphale at full speed along twisty country roads in the Bentley was sufficiently distracting.</p><p>“Good Lord, you can’t go 90 miles an hour around a curve like that, Crowley!”</p><p>“Why not?” Crowley asked, as the Bentley took the curve with style. Aziraphale’s knuckles whitened where he was clinging to his door.</p><p>Unfortunately, the alien-sighting site was <em>not </em>interesting. It was a stretch of open road next to a similarly open field, at the edge of Hogback Wood. There was barely any sign of human occupation there, much less alien visitation. Aziraphale looked torn between feeling glum and feeling relieved.</p><p>“Y’know,” said Crowley, getting his bearings, “isn’t Shadwell’s fish pond just over that way?” He waved to indicate Hogback Wood.</p><p>“That’s true,” Aziraphale said, thoughtfully. “The roads here are absurdly convoluted, really—one can drive quite a long way and end up nearly where one started.”</p><p>“So…you wanna go see if we can spot the Kraken?” Crowley grinned.</p><p>Aziraphale did not grin. If anything, his expression tightened. “I suppose we must. Or, I must. You certainly don’t have to, dear boy.”</p><p>Crowley didn’t dignify that with a response, although he did have to pretend he wasn’t out of breath as they proceeded to tromp through the woods. (Weren’t walks in the woods supposed to be calming? Nobody had informed his aching head of that.)</p><p>“Look, Adam’s a smart boy with a <em>very </em>vivid imagination and—and, nnnhhh, good leadership skills,” Crowley said, since Aziraphale’s stress level appeared to be heightening. “He’s had people believing in witches and UFOs and…tunneling Tibetans, apparently—so a giant squid isn’t out of the ordinary for him.”</p><p>Aziraphale smiled, a bit tightly. “He’ll be an excellent novelist someday, perhaps.”</p><p>“Yeah, yeah—or a screenwriter, or…or a DnD dungeon master…if he figures out how to use his powers for good. Otherwise, he’ll be a cult leader, probably.”</p><p> </p><p>The fish pond, which was barely 20 meters across, showed no signs of squids, giant or otherwise. Crowley harbored serious doubts as to whether it even contained fish. He tossed a rock in and only succeeded in annoying a few ducks. (Very duck-shaped ducks, presumably not aliens. Unless all ducks were aliens, something Crowley wasn’t prepared to rule out.)</p><p>It was after the ducks had resettled (with some pointed duckly glaring at Crowley) that the first hint of anything remotely interesting happened, in the form of shouting from the other side of a nearby rise.</p><p>“That sounds like The Them, I believe,” said Aziraphale, cocking his head in a way that even Crowley’s headache-addled head couldn’t deny was cute.</p><p>Since nearly all of The Them’s communication came in the form of shouting, it must have been sheer boredom that prompted Aziraphale and Crowley to move around the fish pond and over the rise.</p><p>On the other side, they encountered their first unusual sight of the morning—a bizarre sight, in fact—The Them without Adam. Even Dog was there, radiating alarm along with the three humans.</p><p>“Is everything alright, my dears?” Aziraphale asked, his previous tautness vanishing beneath his usual air of out-of-touch-grandfather kindness.</p><p>“Adam’s acting weird,” said Pepper.</p><p>“Actually, he is acting weird,” said Wensleydale.</p><p>Brian nodded, the dirt on his face conveying worry instead of enthusiasm.</p><p>“Weird how?” Crowley demanded.</p><p>The Them looked at each other and then back at Aziraphale and Crowley, faces now shuttered, the three of them (and Dog) now a closed, united front.</p><p>“Just weird,” said Pepper, shrugging.</p><p>“Rrriiight,” Crowley said.</p><p>“I’m sure he’ll be right as rain soon, my dear,” said Aziraphale encouragingly.</p><p>“Yeah,” said Pepper, her face flat. “He’ll be fine.”</p><p>“Actually he will be fine,” said Wensleydale.</p><p>Brian nodded.</p><p>Dog whimpered.</p><p>The four of them disappeared into the trees.</p><p> </p><p>“We’d better go talk to him,” said Crowley.</p><p>“What for, my dear?”</p><p>Crowley didn’t know how to explain the sense of protectiveness he felt related to Adam. “Well, aren’t you supposed to be investigating anything weird?” he said instead.</p><p>Aziraphale frowned at him. “A children’s spat is hardly the sort of thing I’m supposed to be looking into, Crowley.”</p><p>“Sure, yeah, but…it’s not like we’ve found anything else. You can at least say you were looking into <em>something</em>. Just spin it in your report. ‘Investigated oddities reported by local youth; determined that they were not a threat to the Host.’”</p><p>Aziraphale gave a small huff. “Fine. But after that, we’re getting you home for some rest.” His blue-gray-green eyes scanned Crowley in a way that was disconcertingly perceptive.</p><p>“M’fine,” Crowley mumbled, inaccurately.</p><p>They pressed on in the direction the kids (and Dog) had come from, soon enough reaching a clearing, where—</p><p>“Uhhhh,” said Crowley.</p><p>“Oh my,” said Aziraphale.</p><p> </p><p>The clearing was scorched. Where there should have been thick, summer-green grass, there was instead a perfect circle of blackened earth, burnt to the ground. Like a bonfire had gotten out of control…except <em>not </em>out of control. Like a bonfire had burned past its edges but stopped exactly when and where it was told.</p><p>And in the center stood Adam, his back to Aziraphale and Crowley, not a singe or a smudge on him.</p><p>Aziraphale and Crowley looked at each other, then back at the unmoving boy.</p><p>“Hey, um, Adam?” said Crowley tentatively. “You..errrgghh…alright there?”</p><p>“They didn’t like it,” said Adam, not turning around.</p><p>“They didn’t like…what, my dear?” asked Aziraphale, gently.</p><p>“What I can do. I thought they’d like it. But they didn’t.”</p><p>Adam turned around. Crowley nearly jumped backwards.</p><p>What was strange was that he <em>didn’t </em>look strange. He looked just like he always did, only…somehow…not.</p><p>“I was just trying to make things better,” he said, with a mouth that looked like his and also did not look like it belonged to him. Crowley’s head pulsed hard enough that he felt tears prickling behind his eyes.</p><p>“Of course you were,” said Aziraphale, which was good, because Crowley didn’t have the capacity to carry on conversation at that point.</p><p>Adam narrowed his eyes. His eyes were the strangest part of him—they were absolutely his usual hazel eyes—an uncertain color a bit like Aziraphale’s, really—and also they were not any human’s usual eyes.</p><p>“Why are you hiding?” Adam asked, those unsettling eyes scanning over the pair of them, like an X-ray for the soul.</p><p>“What’re you talking about?” Crowley glanced around through the mist that was threatening his vision, as if he might have accidentally hidden behind some bushes without noticing. “We’re right here.”</p><p>“No, I mean, you—your real self. It’s hidden. It’s not right.”</p><p>“Ah,” said Aziraphale, in what was no doubt meant to be a nonchalant tone and couldn’t have been farther from it, “I’ve—I’m sure I’ve no idea what you mean, young man; I’m certainly not hiding—”</p><p>“Not <em>you</em>,” said Adam, rolling his eyes in a way that should have looked normal but didn’t. “Everyone knows you’re a dragon. I meant him.”</p><p>He pointed. His point was directed unmistakably at Crowley, but Crowley was too preoccupied with the throbbing in his head and with “everyone knows you’re a dragon” to process it.</p><p>“Everyone knows…” he heard Aziraphale echoing Adam, though it was very faint over the rushing in his ears. “Wait”—it was still Aziraphale’s voice, but was now coming from a long, reverberating distance—“what on Earth do you mean, <em>Crowley </em>is hiding?”</p><p>If Adam answered, Crowley had no idea. The pain in his head wasn’t just a migraine at this point—it felt like his skull was literally splitting in two—“Aaaaggghhh!” he yelled, gripping his head—</p><p> </p><p>And then he transformed into a giant black snake.</p><p> </p><p>At least, said the last part of his brain still capable of coherent thought, Aziraphale would finally have something to put into his report.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>Heads up: It will probably be 2 weeks before Chapter 4, because I'm juggling this fic with Reading Circle Summons (don't do it, kids!). (The good news is that anyone following Reading Circle will get an update next weekend!)</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
</body>
</html>